Peter Thiel prompts wild applause at GOP convention: 'I am proud to be gay. I am proud to be Republican'

Tech entrepreneur Peter Thiel ignited a thunderous applause on
Thursday night when he became the first openly gay man to
address the Republican National Convention and tout his
sexuality onstage.

"I am proud to be gay," Thiel declared. "I am proud to be
Republican. But most of all, I am proud to be an American."

The line prompted the crowd at the GOP convention in
Cleveland to roar with applause and chant, “USA, USA, USA!”

Thiel, a Silicon Valley investor who cofounded PayPal and was the
first major private investor in Facebook, was an early supporter
of Republican nominee Donald Trump.

The billionaire said that he didn't "pretend to agree with every
plank in our party's platform."

"But fake culture wars only distract us from our economic
decline," he contended. "And nobody in this race is being honest
about it except Donald Trump."

Peter
Thiel, cofounder of PayPal, delivers a speech during the
Republican National Convention.Alex
Wong/Getty Images

In his speech, Thiel argued that the US had become
distracted with identity politics.

"When I was a kid, the great debate was about how to defeat the
Soviet Union. And we won," he said. "Now we are told that the
great debate is about who gets to use which bathroom."

Thiel also said that Americans should not accept
incompetence from their government and invoked technology to
illustrate his point.

"Our nuclear bases still use floppy disks. Our newest fighter
jets can't even fly in the rain. And it would be kind to say the
government's software works poorly, because much of the time it
doesn't even work at all," he said.

Thiel added: "That is a staggering decline for the country that
completed the Manhattan Project. We don't accept such
incompetence in Silicon Valley, and we must not accept it from
our government."

The Silicon Valley investor concluded his speech by
contending that Trump would not be a "return to the past."

"He's running to lead us back to that bright future," Thiel said.
"Tonight I urge all of my fellow Americans to stand up and vote
for Donald Trump."